Bingo prizes!

I was recently VERY lucky and won not one but TWO prizes from two different stitching Yahoo groups, finally located my camera, waited for a sunny day and at last here they are!

Thank you so much to Heather and Viv for running the competitions, the wxsw group prize was a gift voucher and the left hand pic shows the items I chose, 2 packets of John James needles size 26 (as I am always wearing mine out!!) and a skein of DMC colour variations 4240, a gorgeous dark blue/purple combination which I need to finish a project from another group, Friendly Stitchers!

The right hand picture shows an adorable Mill Hill kit sent by Viv from Mill Hill Stitchers group, its a perforated paper picture (Buttons and Beads Spring series, Main Street: Ice Cream Shoppe). Viv must know that I love ice-cream, I couldnt resist opening it to show you the pretty threads, beads and the cute ceramic button.

Thanks also to Amy of Down Sunshine Lane who sent these so quickly, the parcel only took one week from USA to Australia!!

Happy Stitching

Bronte challenge: The Professor by Charlotte

This book wasn't on my initial selection, but I found it as a recorded book at our local library. THEN I went to a bookshelf where I have the books I received as prizes at school, and then found it there too! As you can tell from my blog I love stitching, so I decided to listen to the recorded book while stitching.

I can see why Charlotte had a hard time getting this into print. It just doesn't have the special something that Jane Eyre has. In fact I think that this is because you can't really get close to the main character, in fact you hardly find out much about his character. I did persevere and finished it last night, but I wouldnt really recommend it as there isn't a lot of plot and the characters aren't people who seem real either. Anyway I'm glad I read it as its good to see how authors began even if there wasn't the magic of a classic.

Now I'll have to see what to do next on the challenge.

Finished Anne Bronte's Agnes Grey

I've read this as part of Laura's challenge, the version I borrowed from the library was the Penguin Classics version "with a memoir of her sisters by Charlotte Bronte".

It was a nice gentle read and I picked it as I hadn't read it before. Amazing to think that she while waiting for Agnes Grey to be published, she started writing the much wilder Tenant of Wildfell Hall, which was published only a year later.

You can really sympathise with poor Agnes, volunteering to work as a governess and then having such awful disobedient children to manage. They ended up telling Agnes to work for them leaving her no time of her own. Then when she meets Mr Weston, the elder daughter of the family tries to add him to her collection of men. Luckily good trumphs and the story ends happily.

Throughout the book, I kept realising how autobiographical the book was about governessing from the Brontes' own real life experiences. This made it all the more poignant. In the introduction, one critic in the past said: "The heroine is a sort of younger sister to Jane Eyre, but inferior to her in every way". I agree with this sentiment.

After finishing the book, I then read the introduction and another section "Biographical Notice of Ellis and Acton Bell" by Currer Bell dated September 19, 1850. Charlotte wrote beautifully about her sisters, revealing their true identity.

All in all, a pleasant, gentle read.

Recent pieces of bobbin lace

On the left is a piece of Bedfordshire lace I made last year and on the right the present piece on my pillow (well, ONE of my pillows!) an easy Torchon circular design, only a few repeats to go. I am determined to finish this and sew it to the fabric before I start anything else, as I always have a hard time doing the finishing (in my stitching too!!).

Dimensions Sorceress

Another Dimensions Charts and Charms project. She is rather lovely, and I havent added and of the blended filament threads in gold and silver yet. She really will sparkle. First project on black for a long time, so I'm only doing it in daylight.

UFO sampler

This is a sampler kit of a historic sampler that I bought in the US when I worked there in 1980!!! It languished for many years as I put off starting it. One of my needlework groups (2muchXS) has a yearly Jan 1st challenge, we only have to say what we will start and begin it on this day. No pressure to finish it that year! So I started it a couple of years ago. The bottom half is a great picture of animals, flowers, trees etc in satin stitch. I did do some more on it this week. Hope to work on this UFO every Monday! This sampler is stamped on linen, and in the time since 1980 I have changed my tastes a lot and no longer like stamped pieces, but I never give up on things, so one day it will be finished!! I wonder how old I'll be then!

Sew Cozy

Here is my photo of Sew Cozy (a Dimensions Charts and Charms chart) from February 2009!!

Unfortunately no more progress till last week